Milk and Coffee
by JayEllGee
Summary: It wasn't that Becky didn't want to be sexy, she just didn't know how. And it wasn't that she didn't like Bianca, she just didn't have anything in common with her. But if anyone knew how to seduce a Torres man, it was Bianca DeSousa. She was Becky's only hope.
1. Chapter 1

_Thank you to all the lovely people on Tumblr who somehow convinced me that that would be a good idea. Especially __**WellDeservedObscurity**__ (__**ArentYouSophiaLoren_8887**__) and __**TorresBrothersDegrassi**__. You can blame them for this._

_I don't own Degrassi, Dirty Dancing or Point Break. _

_The title of this fic comes from the Rod Stuart song "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy?" I have no shame._

* * *

**Milk and Coffee**

"_Dirty Dancing_, but set at the beach" - that was how _Point Break_ was sold to Becky.

Granted, Becky had never seen_ Dirty Dancing _either - Dad would never have allowed it. But she knew the premise, she knew the songs, she knew it was a classic among romance movies. She was pretty sure _Dirty Dancing_ didn't have a scene where Johnny and Baby don rubber masks and conduct a violent, gruesome bank robbery while Gary Busey ate a meatball sub.

To be fair, she was pretty sure Adam had never seen _Dirty Dancing_ either. She couldn't imagine he or his brother having it in their (incredibly vast) DVD collection.

Bianca had probably seen it. She had probably _lived_ it.

She and Drew were so wrapped up in each other it was almost difficult to work out where one ended and the other began. They moved with the ease of two people who knew one another's bodies just as well as they knew their own. Despite how intermingled their limbs were, they still managed to find their hands, fingers tightly woven together, Bianca's sparkling engagement ring, a gift from Mrs. Torres, the only thing identifying her hands from Drew's.

Adam has _his_ hands clasped around a large bowl of popcorn. Not that he wasn't paying Becky any attention; he had been feeding her pieces of popcorn earlier and they did a little bit of hand-holding and kissing here and there, Becky even rested her head on his shoulder for a little while, but it started to cramp up her neck sitting like that for too long. She hadn't quite worked how people were supposed to be comfortable all curled up and cuddling, it just made Becky stiff.

Bianca, as far as Becky could tell, had been all but living in the Torres house since graduation. Becky got it; she and Drew wanted to spend as much time together before Bianca went to university. Becky supposed that it was bound to happen; she couldn't have Adam over at her house and she was pretty sure Bianca didn't have the best living situation. She didn't mind, but it made showing up to spend time with Adam just the tiniest bit awkward. Every time she came over to see him, Drew and Bianca would just stand and smile at them, making doting noises like they were watching puppies in a pet store or something. It could have been worse, at least Mike Dallas was back home for the summer; having her brother's teammate crash all their dates wasn't really Becky's idea of a good time.

It was Drew who suggested the inevitable double date and he and Adam picked the movie. They had clearly seen if dozens, if not hundreds, of times together and they provided a perfect running commentary throughout the whole thing.

"Man, the ex-presidents really need to get some protection," Drew said as the surfers ran from the bank, drenched in blood and catastrophe. "Real ex presidents get security team, right?"

Adam craned over to grin at his older brother. "You mean like the ex-secret service?"

"Ha-ha, yeah," Drew laughed. "Keanu can be their protection; he _is_ an FBI agent."

"No, no. He's an _eff. Bee. Eye. Agent!_"

"He's a really terrible shot for an _eff. Bee. Eye. Agent!_"

"He should have went to that blindfold diving course with Gary Busey," Adam said solemnly. "You think if the ex-presidents were Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley and Kennedy, Keanu's aim would be better?"

"Ooh," Drew cringed. "_Dude_."

"What, too soon?"

Bianca, who seemed more used to this back-and-forth than Becky, simply sat rolling her eyes with a half smile on her face.

"As insightful as the commentary is, boys," she said, untangling herself from Drew with expert ease, "you're drowning out the actual movie."

She crawled over Drew to grab the remote, making no attempt at being modest about it. Becky was already not keen on seeing Bianca's shorts-clad behind pushing up into the air for the world to see, but she actually felt herself _gasp_ at what else she saw.

A thong. She was wearing a _thong_. Right there in the Torres house! Mr and Mrs. Torres were upstairs!

Bianca didn't seem to notice nor care as she reclined back into Drew up turned up the volume. She turned around to see Becky staring at her. Becky could only imagine what her face must have looked like. She tucked her hair behind her ears anxiously.

"So," she said brightly, hoping to divert from her shock from Bianca's brazen display, "how do you two get together?"

Drew pulled an uncomfortable face, puffing up his cheeks and pushing the air out slowly.

"It's, uh," he stammered, "well we were much younger then and it was a weird time for both of us and math isn't really my best subject and-"

"-We hooked up in a boiler room," Bianca finished, sounding far too casual for such a bold statement.

"We, uh, hooked up in a boiler room," Drew echoed, though sounding a lot less casual. Adam grinned to himself as he grabbed another handful of popcorn.

It did nothing to make Becky feel less flustered. She could feel herself blink stupidly without saying anything.

"Hooked…"

"You and Adam got to know each other on the play, right?" Bianca said, cutting her off but still incredibly cool looking.

A school play. It sounded like a way less interesting a story than the boiler room, but at least it would be an easier one to share with the grandkids.

"Yes," Becky replied, feeling herself beam, "Adam let me be in the school play, even after how awful I had been about it."

"I couldn't help myself," Adam grinned, "you had a little drawn-on moustache, it was adorable."

He gently poked the space above her lips before kissing it. Drew and Bianca did the puppy-watching faces again. Fantastic. Bianca wore thongs and had tattoos and seduced men into boiler rooms. And Becky drew on fake moustaches.

Normally Becky wouldn't have minded being "cute" or "adorable" and being anything more than that didn't make her feel entirely comfortable, but she had seen how close and intimate Drew and Bianca had been all summer, and she suddenly felt comically naive in comparison. Even Adam, who Drew teased about being an innocent goody-two-shoes, had way more experience than Becky had, but was good enough not to be pushy with her, she'd never been in a serious relationship before. Not to mention she had really gotten to see just how wonderful and kind and gentlemanly Adam was. He was being so understanding with her family. Mom and Dad's new tactic was not to constantly lecture Becky about their relationship, they seemed to think that she was just going through a rebellious phase and forbidding her from seeing Adam would just make her want to see him even more. She was pretty sure they were just waiting for her to grow out of it. Luke had just settled on being incredibly rude to Adam all the time, not outright mean, but still unjustifiably rude, making sly little comments and digs whenever he could and Adam just took it, shrugging it off and saying that he'd had worse. And all she could offer in return was looking adorable with a fake moustache.

She just wasn't good at the desirable thing. She blushed when he whispered sweet nothings to her and stammered when she tried to return the compliment. She got jumpy and ticklish when he grabbed her waist. She still giggled when they made out. _Giggled_. Like she was still in middle school. No wonder Drew and Bianca "awwed" at them all the time. She could see why a bowl of popcorn would be more appealing to hold, quite honestly.

"Is he actually going to shoot Swayze?" Bianca asked, turning her attention back to the movie. Keanu, playing the FBI agent-turned-surfer Johnny Utah, was chasing Patrick Swayze, one of the surfer-turned-bank robbers (disguised as Ronald Regan) down a busy street.

"Nah, he can't do it," Adam said. "Keanu loves him too much."

"I wasn't lying when I said this was a love story," Drew joked. "This is _way_ more romantic than _Dirty Dancing_,"

"Maybe next time we can watch the _real_ _Dirty Dancing_," Bianca teased, running her hand through Drew's hair.

"Maybe we can, uh, re-enact it?" Drew tried. "Salsa with your favourite dance partner?"

"Sorry, Elvis," Bianca grinned, now running her hand down his neck, "but I've seen your moves and you're nowhere _near_ as good a dance partner as your brother."

Bianca and the brothers laughed, albeit somewhat nervously. Becky tried to join in, but felt stupid for doing so since she had no idea what they were talking about. It was becoming a pretty common occurrence; the three of them had such a long history together and they were constantly retelling stories of their Vegas escapades, or how they were going to "top the amazingness of last summer" (which didn't sound all the amazing since it seemed to consist largely of Bianca doing paperwork for Mr. Torres, Adam failing to do anything one-handed and Drew guilt-spoiling everyone.) She let the words sink in; _dance partner_. Adam and Bianca were dance partners? Becky didn't even know Adam _liked_ to dance. And if Bianca danced anything like she reached for remote controls…

She felt herself freeze. She tried to shake the feeling off, it could have meant anything, but her stomach still felt knotted up.

"Dance partners?" she asked, smiling feebly.

Everyone looked at everyone else, as if trying to work out what they were supposed to say. Becky tried to remain smiling despite realizing that she had managed to open a can of worms she didn't even know existed. It was clearly something that they allowed to _allude_ to but never actually _talk_ about in any great detail. Adam and Bianca? Were they a thing at one point? Did he really go for girls like that?

"Yeah," Adam eventually said, "back in the remedial gym days. We got paired up to ballroom dance together."

"We were so kick ass," Bianca added. Despite her smile, she looked apprehensive.

"This was before Drew and Bianca were a thing," Adam added for Becky's sake.

"And you pulled out all the moves," Bianca laughed, "you were channeling Casanova that day."

"Uh, actually I was channeling _Drew_. All that negging stuff is _his_ M.O."

"It's true, I taught him that," Drew added proudly.

"So _that's_ why it worked," Bianca said, curling into Drew.

"Oh, it worked?" Drew asked, mischievously.

Bianca lifted her head up, her lips level with Drew's. "I guess I just have a thing for your overblown arrogance."

"You fell for me before you even knew me," he grinned, going in for the kiss.

Everyone else had settled back into a more relaxed state again, but Becky still felt tense. Adam used to like Bianca, and Bianca, it seemed, wasn't all that uninterested in Adam. It seemed so bizarre. Becky was _nothing_ like Bianca.

"Yup, I'm basically the best wingman ever," Adam joked, turning his attention back to Becky. He put the big bowl of popcorn on the table, freeing his hands. Was that supposed to be Becky's cue to do something? She wasn't sure where to start. She wasn't as practiced as Drew and Bianca were.

She watched them; the way Bianca absentmindedly ran her hand up the inside of his leg like she'd been doing it forever, the way she didn't even have to say a word to grab Drew's attention, the way is made Drew grin like a Cheshire cat.

Becky could do that. Probably.

She cleared her throat, her hand suddenly felt very heavy. She could feel it shaking. She had never touched a boy's leg like that before. What if she did it wrong?

_Just take your time_, she told herself,_ go slowly._

She lifted her arm up, ready to make her move. It trembled even more. Her bracelet jangled so furiously it almost drowned out the movie. Everyone stared at her.

"You cold?" Adam asked, head tilted in concern. "I can get you a blanket or-"

He stopped as Drew loudly cleared his throat and glared at him, making the same urging face Luke used when he was trying to tell Becky something without speaking. Becky understood that he was using the sibling telepathy, but it seemed that each set of siblings had their own language and she couldn't work out what he was trying to say.

"Or, you know," Adam said casually, "_I_ could warm you up."

"Okey-dokey," Becky beamed. She bounced in her seat as Adam moved in, draping his arm around her. She was finally doing _something_ right, even if she didn't know what it was.

As Adam made his move, Becky made hers. Resting her hand on his knee, slowly slipping down to the inside of his leg and taking her time as she moved it up-

"Oh, hey," Adam yelped, "this is the best part!"

He twisted himself towards the screen, quickly snatching his leg away, leaving Becky's hand to collapse onto the void between them on the couch cushion. What did she do wrong?

Keanu writhed on the ground, firing his gun in the air and screaming in frustration as his lover Patrick Swayze jumped over a wall and ran out of sight.

After an hour of terrible dialogue and stilted acting, Becky was finally starting to sympathize with Johnny Utah.


	2. Chapter 2

_Thank you to everyone who has reviewed, followed and favourited. I couldn't believe my inbox when I saw it at first! You guys rock! _

_This chapter says more about my taste in music that I honestly care to admit…_

* * *

Cheesy eighties rock blared through the CD player. It was the only thing stopping the car journey being completely silent.

It wasn't that Bianca didn't _like_ Becky; she seemed like a really sweet girl and everything, but… Bianca couldn't quite shake the feeling that her very existence offended Becky on some level. She never knew what she was supposed to say to her beyond small talk, and even then she still seemed to somehow manage to shock and horrify the poor girl.

Admittedly, the boiler room thing may have been going too far. She mostly just wanted to see how big Becky's eyes could widen from horror. She was starting to wonder if that was a little _too_ mean. She knew Drew wouldn't mind – everyone else they knew was well aware of how she and Drew first got acquainted, but everyone else wasn't quite as sheltered as Becky Baker.

She was staring out of the window, absentmindedly plaiting strands of her long blonde hair. The cartoon birds who probably usually helped her with this were conspicuously absent. Not that Bianca was expecting much conversation, Becky never really said much around her anyway; the boys put most of the effort into keeping a conversation going between the four of them. And Bianca had no idea what she supposed to talk to Becky about-

"It's really nice of you to drive me home," she suddenly said, shaking Bianca out of the autopilot mode she had fallen into.

"Don't worry about it."

A sentence each – perhaps a combined total of a dozen words. That had to be a new record. Mr. Mister filled the silence that followed the dead conversation. Bianca let herself slip back into autopilot.

The gap between the last song ending and the next song beginning only highlighted how truly awkward the silence was. Bianca rolled through conversation starters in her head. There must have been something she and Becky could talk about that wouldn't completely shock Becky and utterly bore Bianca.

Luckily, Becky broke the silence for them.

"Ooh, _Cherry Pie_," she cheered as the opening chords of the Warrant song crunched through Bianca's crappy speakers. "Adam likes this song – he says I'm his cherry pie."

Bianca cocked an eyebrow at her.

"Because I'm all-American?" Becky explained, "like cherry pie?"

Bianca smiled to herself; Becky may not have known what _Cherry Pie_ was really about, but Adam _definitely_ did. He wasn't _nearly_ as innocent as he looked. But apparently Becky was _just_ as innocent as she looked – perhaps even moreso.

"It's one of his favourites," Becky added for good measure.

"I should hope so," Bianca said, nodding to the stereo, "it's _his_ CD. It's been in there since _last_ summer and he's never actually bothered to take it back."

"I never realized how much time you all spend together," Becky said, her "smile" almost a completely straight line across the bottom half of her face.

Bianca took a deep breath, taking her time to reply to a statement that was more complicated than it seemed on the surface.

"Well last summer was pretty intense for all of us, I think we really needed each other. We all got really close."

She tried to keep her voice steady, but was sure she could hear it shaking. That summer didn't even feel _real_ anymore; Mr. Torres telling her she made a better paralegal than some of the people on his staff, Mrs. Torres giving enough of a damn about her to ask her about her future and college and how she was going to make that a reality, Drew and Adam pulling out all the stops to make her laugh while they blasted Toto in her car. It felt like family. Bianca had never had that before. Then her shitty exhaust would _bang _and everyone would duck for their lives, screaming until they could make sure they were all still alive. Bianca had to pull over at the side of the road until everyone had calmed down again, crying and shaking because it was her fault that her car sucked so much and she had managed to further traumatize a guy who had received beatings and death threats from a gang (because of her) and another guy who had just been _shot_ by a gang member (because of her.) Drew, flung himself forward from the back seat, throwing his arm tightly around Adam, then Adam, seeing how upset Bianca was, leaned across from the passenger side to hug her with his good arm, then Drew hugged her, then Adam joked that they all needed a "super friendship group hug" and suggested that they get matching bracelets which helped put everyone's nerves to rest for a while. But Bianca still felt totally shit about it all day.

"Besides," she said, snapping herself out of it. "I made him enough cookies that summer, I think I at least deserve a CD out of it"

Becky straightened up, snapping her head around at meerkat speed to look at Bianca.

"You like to bake?"

Bianca was pretty into baking; it was fun, it was relaxing. And legal - legal was always a plus. There was something so great about being in total control of something; to create something and have it turn into something good and useful. To do something that makes other people happy. To put time and effort into something that doesn't hurt people. She mostly just stuck to cookies, fearing that the intricately decorated cakes and pastries she watched the celebrity bakers create with sheer amazement would end in catastrophe. She loved to draw out the cake designs, though; topsy-turvy hat boxes wrapped in brightly coloured bows, giant roses made of chocolate ganache framed with strawberries with sugared leaves, wedding cakes drapes with real lace and dotted with pearls, but she never dared to take the idea further than paper. Then, inspired by watching too many episodes of _Cake Boss_, she tried to make Drew a football themed cake for his birthday back in January. He was still technically seeing Katie at the time, and Bianca wanted to give Drew something special without spending a suspicious amount of money on someone who was just supposed to be a friend. She created the design in her sketch book - it was two tiers high; the bottom one chocolate sponge covered in green fondant and the top one vanilla sponge covered in blue fondant, white icing piped along the border and the number "18" on top in brown fondant with thin white icing laces. Only, in her excitement, she didn't quite wait for the sponge to cool down before decorating and the whole thing melted, looking more like a horrific surrealist painting that anything else. Then, as she tried to salvage it, the top tier started to sink into the bottom one. Apparently she was supposed to put rods inside the sponge to stop that from happening. She brought it over to Drew's anyway. Katie seemed quite smug with the mess Bianca arrived with, but Drew, turning his head to the side and squinting through the catastrophe to see what it could have looked like before it all went to hell, _loved_ it. No one had ever made him a cake from scratch before and he happily dug into it, getting melted turquoise fondant down the Ralph Lauren shirt Katie had bought him as a present. After that, Bianca decided that baking was really quite awesome.

"Sure, I follow along with Rachel Allen sometimes," Bianca shrugged. "With the subtitles on. Do you bake?"

"Well my name _is_ Becky Baker," she sang-songed. "I _love_ to bake. We have a church bake sale once a month, it's my favourite thing in the world!"

Bianca couldn't help but grin. Of _course_ Becky was a baker.

"Were you, like, created in a lab by Walt Disney or something?"

It was supposed to be a light-hearted joke, but Becky's smile faltered as soon as she said it. Shit. She had kicked the puppy.

"I just mean," she added hastily, "you're just such a sweet girl."

"Oh," Becky muttered, pulling a long blonde section of hair behind her ear.

"And Adam's like a kid brother to me," she threw in, "and _he's_ really sweet. He deserves a girl as sweet as you."

Finally, a real smile again.

"Thank you," Becky blushed, "and Drew's lucky to have you; you're a sweet girl too."

Bianca scoffed, more bitterly that she would have cared for. "I am _not_ sweet."

It was supposed to be self-deprecating; a dig towards herself, not Becky. But if Becky's little animated face was anything to go by, she didn't take it that way.

"And there's nothing wrong with being sweet," she insisted as she pulled into Becky's street. "Sweet is good."

She pulled over in front of Becky's perfect suburban house. Waiting to awkwardly say her goodnights to her and letting her go Bianca could accidentally hurt even more of her feelings.

Instead, Becky let out a deep sigh, drumming her hands on her lap.

"Would you like to come inside?" she asked, unclicking her seatbelt. "My mom has a huge stack of baking books in the kitchen if you want to have a look."

"Uh-"

"Great! Do you like Julia Child?"

"Um-"

"Yay," Becky clapped, jumping out of the car, running to the diver's side and all but _yanking_ Bianca out into the street.

Becky, having spent most of the car journey sitting in awkward silence, suddenly couldn't stop taking.

"_-For the Easter service I made hot cross buns. Have you ever tried them? They're almost like scones, but with the texture of a sweet bun-_"

Bianca locked her car and Becky bounded to the front door. She hadn't heard Becky say more than two sentences infront of her before. Bianca had suspected that she was may even be a Stepford wife on more that one occasion. Suddenly there was a girl infront of her who had a voice and interests and opinions - albeit quite a _strange_ girl, but an actual human person nonetheless.

"_-And you could just make the crosses with icing after they've baked, but really that's cheating-"_

She hadn't really seen the forceful side of Becky before. She had always just been sweet, smiley, shy- almost _meek_ around Bianca. Quite frankly, Bianca wasn't all that sure what Adam saw in her even if she was very sweet. Sweet, whilst a very nice quality in a person, was quite dull on its own. This enthusiastic, persuasive girl was _way_ more his speed.

"_-It's best to eat them fresh out the oven with butter spread over them and glass of milk to wash it down."  
_

She was so passionate; it was almost impossible not to get swept in her enthusiasm. Bianca was certain she almost caught herself bouncing along to the front door along with her. Almost.

"Come on in," Becky said, pushing the front door open.

A blast of heat hit Bianca as soon as she set foot inside the house. It was _sweltering_.

"It's good to get out of the cold, huh?" Becky said, hanging her coat up in the hallway.

It was July. Bianca had been living in booty shorts all summer. It was in no way cold.

"That's one of the things I miss most about Florida," Becky sighed, signaling for Bianca to take a seat and joining her in the living room, "it's just so _cold_ up here. Nice to get away from the humidity though."

An image forced its way into Bianca's head of Becky's perfect blonde Rapunzel hair frizzy and massive from the humid air, her face completely obscured like Cousin It receiving an electric shock. She involuntary let out the tiniest snort of laughter.

"What's wrong?"

"Oh, uh, nothing. I guess you just get used to the cold."

It was easier getting used to the cold than it was the intense heat of Becky's house. The Baker house, rather appropriately, was like an oven.

"I can get those books for you if you want," Becky offered. "Do you want anything to drink, or-"

"Buttercup?"

Mr. Baker wasn't anything like Bianca had pictured. She was expecting a big, foreboding man adorned in a reverend's collar and waving a giant bible at all times. Mr. Baker looked pretty harmless, _friendly_ even. He was wearing _slacks_. He finished walking down the stairs and joined the girls in the searing heat of the living room.

"I didn't hear you come in," he said, "and with a friend."

"Dad, this is Bianca, she drove me home," Becky explained. "She's Drew's girlfriend - uh, fiancée."

Mr. Baker offered his hand and Bianca took it. "Nice to meet you, Mr. Baker."

He nodded to her with a warm smile. Maybe Becky and Adam were exaggerating his evils. She knew that Drew painted Audra as a gigantic monster when she was nothing but. Parents always seem awful when they stop their kids from doing whatever they want whenever they want, but at least Becky and Drew had people who actually gave enough of a damn about them to ruin their fun.

"Drew, do I know Drew?" Mr. Baker asked. Becky took a shaky breath.

"Drew Torres," Becky answered defiantly. "Adam's brother."

"You were with Adam tonight?" Mr. Baker asked in a low and quiet voice.

"Yes, we watched a movie at his house."

"Becky you know how I feel about-"

"-I don't see why you're annoyed, I though your new tactic was to wait for me to _come to my senses_ anyway."

"Becky-"

"Funny thing, I'm still waiting for _you_ to come to _your_ senses."

"Rebecca Baker you won't talk to me like that," he said, his calm tone making the words more threatening sounding that yelling ever could.

Becky didn't say anything back, but her sweet little Disney Princess face was re-inked into a perfectly pretty scowl. Her cheeks rosy with anger (or from standing in the sauna of a living room.)

"Bianca I'm sorry you had to witness this," he said, his voice still eerily calm. "Thank you for brining Becky home, but I think you should go now."

She turned to red-cheeked Becky, her face steely with determination. Bianca twisted her car keys around her fingers, wondering is her face was equally red from the heat.

"Becky?"

"It's fine, Bianca," Becky said, her tone lower and more serious that Bianca had ever heard. "Thank you for driving me home."

Bianca nodded, keeping an eye on the two of them before she had to turn around to open the front door again.

The summer evening suddenly felt icy cold as Bianca left the Baker's oven. It suddenly didn't feel like shorts weather anymore.

She shut down the AC before turning the engine back on. ZZ Top warning that the girl had legs, and she _knew_ how to use them as she pulled out of suburbia and back home.

Becky Baker: the rebellious preacher's daughter.

She was a little bit more of a badass than Bianca thought.


	3. Chapter 3

_I learned so much about baking from writing this chapter! I don't own any of the books mentioned._

* * *

"Thanks for coming over. Bianca left before I could get those books for her."

"No problem."

Adam cautiously stepped into the house, taking a good look around before committing to fully entering the hallway.

"It's just us," Becky assured him.

"That makes a change," he remarked as he followed her to the kitchen. "I was starting to think both our families were under house arrest or something."

"At least your family are all _nice_ to me," Becky groaned. "I wish I could say the same."

"C'mon, they've gotten better," Adam insisted, though Becky didn't quite believe him. He stopped when he saw the large pile of baking books towering the kitchen counter. "Whoa."

"My mom really likes to bake," Becky said, climbing onto a kitchen stool and inviting Adam to join her.

"I never realized how much you could write on the subject of cupcakes," Adam remarked, scanning the pages of a particularly thick book.

"Well, there's just so much you can do with cupcakes," Becky explained. "Red velvet, chocolate, lemon meringue - the possibilities are endless!"

Adam smiled to himself before going back to his book.

"What is it?" Becky asked.

"Nothing," he grinned, slamming the book shut and packing up as much of the stack as he could carry in his backpack. "So is this us?"'

"It should be," Becky answered, taking the small remaining stack. "Wait no - I left on upstairs, I was reading it last night."

"Which one?"

"_Artisan Baking_, it's grey and yellow. It's my favourite."

Adam didn't say anything; he just smiled at her. That sweet, genuine smile that made her feel comforted and exposed in equal parts. She could feel her face get warm.

"Can you get on my bed?" she said before she could process what she was actually saying.

Maybe she didn't actually say it. Maybe it was just in her head.

Adam grinned and raised an eyebrow at her. She so wished he wouldn't look her in the eye. She really just said what she thought she said.

"No, uh, I mean," she stammered, "c-can you get it, it's, um, it's on my bed. The book. It's on my bed."

He jumped off the stool without remarking on her catastrophic malfunction.

"Lead the way."

She let Adam follow her up the stairs and up to her bedroom where she had been pouring over _Artisan Baking _the night before, fawning over the baguettes and rolls and how they came from nothing to turn into something amazing. She loved to see the artistry and technique it took to get that perfect texture and the satisfying way the raw dough rose on its own before it needed to go in the oven. She admired the sheer patience, practice and understanding of theory it took to make good bread like that. It may have taken infinitely more time and effort than picking up a loaf at the store, but was so worth the wait. Quality would always be worth the wait.

When she finally made her way to the front door of her room, a rush of nerves attacked the pit of her stomach. She couldn't even explain why until Adam pointed it out to her.

"I've never seen your room before."

Oh goodness, he was right. He had never seen her bedroom before. It was quite a personal thing to show someone else. Was he going to think that it was some sort of hint? They had been together for four months, was that around the right time to get more… _personal_?

"This is it," she said, taking a deep, reassuring breath before opening the door.

Becky had never felt particularly self-aware about her room before. She didn't have as much space in suburban Toronto as she had in rural Florida, but she felt she made do. She was still luckier than a lot of other people and she was grateful for what she had. She managed to get all her belongings to fit in without having to sacrifice any to the trash (or, more realistically, Goodwill.) She was starting to regret that achievement when she looked around.

Her Niall Horan poster adorned with heart stickers. Her white four-poster bed draped with pink chiffon protecting her teddy bears from the low, late afternoon sun. Her unicorn music box with matching ceramic figurines either side of it. It would be childish for a seven-year-old let alone a seventeen-year-old.

Adam thankfully didn't burst into laughter, instead he admired the trinkets scattered around on her bookshelf.

"Cool, you have a Nancy Drew Spy Pen?" Adam asked, picking up the pen and admiring the chunky, flowery, purple-and-yellow handle. When untwisted, small items could be put inside the plastic, hollow tube. Becky used to keep her shiniest pennies hidden away in it. It certainly wasn't "cool" but she appreciated his attempts to make her room seem less infantile.

"I had one of these," Adam reminisced. "Drew and I used to send top secret messages to each other through it. And treasure maps. Actually, _mostly_ treasure maps. I think Drew had it in his head that if you make a treasure map, the treasure will just magically appear there."

"I didn't know they made them for little boys too."

"They didn't."

"Oh."

"Is this the book?" Adam asked, not even skipping a beat before making a seat for himself on her bed and flipping through the copy of _Artisan Baking_ lying on top of the comforter. "That bread looks amazing, what is it?"

He turned the book around for Becky to see the photo of a thick crusty loaf covered in sesame seeds.

"It looks like a filone."

"I need one of these in my life."

"We could try making one some day," Becky suggested.

"And this is one of the reasons I need a Becky Baker in my life."

She wanted to kiss him, but wondered if it was appropriate. He was sitting on her _bed_. Part of Becky reasoned that sitting was sitting whether you did it on a sofa or a bench or a bed. But it seemed more _adult_ somehow. It was where she slept. Where she dreamt. And Adam, a featured player in many of her dreams, was sitting there; blurring the lines between her safe, comfortable reality and the fantasies that made her blush furiously when she was awake.

He started to slowly take off his hoodie. He was taking off his clothes. In her room. On her bed.

"Man, it's hot in here, huh?"

Becky didn't think so, but she didn't have the best grasp on was constituted "hot" in the Toronto climate.

"You want me to take your cardigan?" he offered.

"I'm fine," she insisted. How could Adam stand being in just a t-shirt? Toronto summer was not the same a _real_ summer. But maybe it felt warm to a more established Torontonian? Even in the middle of summer her parents had to bump the heating up, still not out of "Floridian mode" when it came to adjusting to the temperature. Maybe Adam really was genuinely hot.

But taking off his clothes on her bed? Asking Becky to join in? Was he being suggestive or just Canadian?

He tilted his head at her. He had the most amazing angles; the perfectly straight lines that separated his jaw line from his neck and his neck from his shoulders looked like they could have been drawn by a ruler with faultless precision. Like God had worked overtime just to make them perfect.

She loved to stroke his neck when she kissed him, feeling her hands brush up and down the perfectly straight line of his jaw. Letting her fingers rise and fall over the sharp contours in a seamlessly rhythmic way, feeling her wrist turn in an exact ninety-degree angle when she got to his shoulders. Those _shoulders_. They could double as a spirit level they were so straight and precise. There was something so militant and obedient about them, like he was ready to face anything at all times and it made her feel so incredibly safe with him. She never realized such perfection could exist in real people.

She never dared allow herself to move further than that, down his torso, sliding her hand to his back and down to the base of his spine-

_He was on her bed. Craning his perfect neck._

She reminded him of the love interest in every terrible vampire film she had ever seen; lifting their necks, exposing their jutting collarbones - _letting_ themselves be exposed. Wanting that intimate touch from their... well, their _lover_.

He caught her in his stare. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah," she gasped. Her own neck felt terribly itchy. She didn't dare look down, fearing how red and blotchy it had become. Her mouth suddenly felt bone dry, thirsty for something she couldn't pinpoint, but she knew she wouldn't find it in the kitchen.

It was in her bedroom. On her bed.

She wished that she could be bold like Bianca; that she could show Adam just how much he meant to her without stumbling over her words or fumbling with her hands. Telling him was nice, but there were only so many times you could tell someone how great they are before it stops having the same shine. She wasn't fluid and relaxed, she was gangly and awkward.

She wanted nothing more than to have it come effortless to her. To be able to flirt and sway and attract Adam's attention as easily as he could attract hers or Bianca could attract Drew's. She wanted to be able to wrap herself around him and kiss his neck while he grabbed her hair with one hand and her waist with the other. She wanted to be able to drive him crazy.

But she couldn't do that. She was the girl, it wasn't the right way to do it; it wasn't _proper_. She wouldn't even know what to _do_ with herself!

She had to get _him_ to want to do that. If Adam took the lead, she could just follow along without having to worry so much about what she was supposed to do with herself.

She had to make him want her.

"So…," she tried. "Do you like my bed?"

She bent over, stroking her hand over the pink satin comforter, just making it up as she was going along and hoping for the best.

"Uh, sure," Adam answered, bouncing up and down a few times for good measure, "it's comfy."

"It's also very… _soft_," she said, trying to make her voice sound low and seductive. "Do you know what else is soft?"

"Uh, what?"

"Um," on no. She hadn't thought it through that far. What else was soft? _What else was soft?!_

"This, uh, this _pillow_," she said quickly, sitting down beside Adam, picking up the pillow and presenting it to him. "Do you want to…. touch it?"

"It's very nice," Adam said, petting it a few times whilst pulling a bemused face. "Are you feeling okay? You sound like you've got a sore throat."

"I'm so fin-ugh-," she spluttered, choking back the sensual "growl" she was attempting. "I'm fine, thank you."

"You sure?"

She didn't think it was possible to fail so drastically so suddenly. It was all so far out of her realm. She had to try a different avenue, something she was more familiar with. She looked over to Adam's hands, still holding the book that was causing this whole situation.

Bread. She knew _plenty_ about bread.

"You know," she whispered, "if we're going to make some bread, I'm going to have to teach you how to handle the dough."

"Cool," Adam smiled. "Sounds like fun."

"You have to really get your hands into it," she said, reaching her hand up and grabbing his upper arm. "Like this."

"Okay," he said slowly, staring at the hand she still had around his arm, kneading her fingers into it.

"Yes," she said, wondering why she thought that this would ever be a good idea, "this is the way to do it. Good."

She was just sitting there, kneading one of his arms for a reason she couldn't justify or explain, but it had something to do with bread, apparently.

Bianca DeSousa would never ever do something so insanely awkward.

"Or, you know," Becky said, clambering over the bed to sit behind Adam and placing her hands on his shoulders, "this is good too."

Massaging. That _had_ to be more alluring than ballroom dancing. It was certainly a step up from arm squishing. Any second now, Adam would turn around and pull her into a passionate kiss and he could take over. Any second.

"What did I do to deserve the spa session?" Adam asked.

"Oh, you know," Becky said, even though she didn't remotely know.

She sat there, pressing her hands into those perfect shoulders, feeling every curve and jut of the bone. Feeling her hands press into his skin. It felt _so_ good. She pressed in harder, bypassing the skin and muscle to feel the structure of those wonderfully exact shoulders. She wondered if she would be able to feel that small piece of bullet still inside of him is she pressed in hard enough.

"Wow," Adam gasped, "you have very, uh, strong fingers."

Her brain felt like it was tangled in knots; like English wasn't her first language, but rather something she had only heard bits and pieces of from bad movies and cheesy songs. Like the meaning of the phrases were totally alien to her and she wasn't sure about the smaller words in-between, but she as going to take a stab at speaking it anyway.

"Your shoulders are nice to my hands to feel."

_What_? What was that even supposed to _mean_?!

She tried to blink herself smart again, but it didn't seem to be working. More and more of her brainpower seemed to be abandoning her, jumping ship as she made more and more of a fool of herself.

She didn't stop, even though part of her was becoming more and more convinced that the whole thing was a terrible idea, she was sure that if she suddenly stopped then it would become weird and awkward.

She tried to focus on what she was doing, moving from Adam's shoulders to his shoulder blades and down the muscles in his back. She could feel the structure and curve of the vertebras of his spine. She never realized how satisfying it could be to press her fingers against it; to touch someone so closely you could feel the outside and inside of their body at the same time. It made her head reel to think about how all those part connected to make this one whole person, sitting on her bed while her hands explored all the tiny details of his body. She wanted to know everything about it; all the ins and outs. Every freckle, every dip, every protrusion, every angle. She wanted every part of her body to touch every part of his.

Her heart was beating very fast. She had never touched him so much – she had never touched _anyone_ so much. She never knew how gratifying touching someone could be or even if she was _allowed_ to feel so gratified. She wondered if the pulse she could feel vibrating down through her fingers was just her imagination.

She was getting dangerously lower. She would have to work out what she was supposed to do once she ran out of spine. Becky would be forever grateful that Adam couldn't see the look of blind panic on her face. She had no idea what she was doing. What was she supposed to be _doing_?

She couldn't just _end_. That would be so pathetic. There had to be some sort of smooth transition into whatever was supposed to come next. Eventually Adam would step in and she wouldn't have to feel so completely clueless.

"Is-is hot still how you're feeling?" She managed to say. It least it was decipherable.

"Uh, yeah, it's pretty hot in here."

"Allow me to cool you."

She wrapped her fingers around the hem of his t-shirt. She hoped the tugging in it's own would be enough to make him turn around to face her, but apparently she wasn't doing enough. She swallowed down her nerves and began to slide it up higher.

She felt herself jump as Adam snatched himself away from her.

"That was great, thanks." He said, springing to his feet, tightly clinging on to the book they were supposed to be retrieving. "I'm so relaxed now, woo."

Reality suddenly slammed back into her body, like going from one extreme in temperature to another. Like moving at the speed of light and coming to a sudden _halt_. What was she _doing_? She was taking off his clothes. Two feet away from her parent's bedroom. In front of Niall Horan and all her teddy bears!

Of course he wasn't going to think it was sexy.

She could feel herself fishmouthing as her vocabulary flung itself back into her brain and sorted itself into something resembling sense.

"I," she stammered, "I, uh."

"I should probably jet before you parents get home," Adam said, grabbing his hoodie off the bed beside her. "I don't want to get you in trouble."

He kissed her on the cheek like she was a preschooler. She probably _did_ seem like that to him in that moment.

"Call you later?"

"I, uh," she threw out. "Yeah, sure."

"Right," Adam nodded curtly. "I'll let myself out."

As soon as he disappeared into the hallway, Becky threw her head down on the bed. A frame of cuddly toys surrounding her like a fluffy halo.

She couldn't even flirt with her own boyfriend without acting like a huge dork.

He was going to think she was the biggest loser on the planet.

She was so out of her league.

She was going to need some serious help.

* * *

_I must admit, I'm not particularly well versed on my 1D members. Would Becky like Niall the best? Or would she like one of the other ones? Feel free to let me know, Directioners! _


End file.
